


has the world gone mad or is it me?

by thermodynamicActivity (chlorinetrifluoride)



Series: The Collegestuck 'Verse [33]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Human, C-PTSD, DDNOS, Dissociation, Gen, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Mental Health Issues, Suicidal Thoughts, Unintentional Self Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-10
Updated: 2017-06-10
Packaged: 2018-11-12 07:10:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,607
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11156838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chlorinetrifluoride/pseuds/thermodynamicActivity
Summary: Ancient memories and half-realities jumble around in your mind like the contents of a kaleidoscope. You almost preferred dissociation to the murmuring cacophony of your mind. It’ll just keep getting louder, and louder, and louder, and you’re not sure how to make it stop yet.You wish you could dissociate on command, like flipping a light switch inside you.--Calliope versus her current mental state.





	has the world gone mad or is it me?

**Author's Note:**

> trigger warning for dissociation (dissociative amnesia and age regression, mostly), mild suicidal ideation, and allusions to sexual assault (the last thing didn’t happen, however, and is purely hypothetical)
> 
> if you haven't already read "the skin that wrapped my frame wasn't made to play this game", "playing with my shadow", "moving to the moon", or "take me in, take me, take", you might want to read those (especially the first two) before this, otherwise this fic may not make as much sense as it could.

**_July 2010 - Calliope Calver_ **

You carry your disorders like stones in your pocket, taking them out and turning them over and over every so often to inspect them. The newest one, freshly bestowed upon you two weeks ago, is DDNOS.

Your more knowledgeable roommate, the one in nursing school, rehashed what your psychiatrist told you. The letters stand for Dissociative Disorder Not Otherwise Specified. It means they’re not quite sure what you have besides depression and PTSD, but they’ve narrowed it down to a few disorders that are related to each other. All of them pertain to your penchant for losing time.

And they all have similar symptoms in most respects, which is why none of your clinicians narrow it down further.

You think of the actual stones in your pockets. These stones are real. When you were a young child, which you suspect you were today, you used to collect the smoothest rocks you could find at the beach. All you need is a rip tide to pull you under. You think of going to Coney Island beach, and telling your other roommate that you have to work. Maybe you’ll drown yourself if you have the inclination. You don’t think you will, though. You’re not suicidal. You’re just… confused. You halfway want the temptation of escape just so you can spurn it and feel triumphant.

You want the feel of sand beneath your toes. A current pulling at your feet. The ebb and flow of the tide.

Ancient memories and half-realities jumble around in your mind like the contents of a kaleidoscope. You almost preferred dissociation to the murmuring cacophony of your mind. It’ll just keep getting louder, and louder, and louder, and you’re not sure how to make it stop yet.

You wish you could dissociate on command, like flipping a light switch inside of you.

Your life has become a lot like the old home movies gathering dust in the basement at 141-15. Back when you and Caliborn were a _team_ and you two would argue over who got to carry the switched-on camcorder damn near everywhere, recording all that you could. Scenes switch without warning. 

One moment, it’s 8 AM and you’re getting ready for your summer classes at NYU and the next, it’s 7 PM, and you’re at home, watching your roommate play Halo.

(Your father used to watch the movies you and Caliborn made, even the shitty ones, with gusto. You miss him. You miss his English accent. You miss his mild manner. Every child has a parent they emulate most, and yours is your father, who still texts you twice a week, asking if you, Porrim, Mituna, and Kurloz need any money.

Or in your case, a hug.)

You sort-of collect your thoughts, in the same way you would several sheets of windblown paper. They’re not all in order, but they’ve been stacked somewhat neatly again.

“What happened?” you ask Mituna.

Ze shrugs. You’re going to have to be more specific.

“What happened to me?” you ask hir, your beer bottle green eyes searching for an answer.

“I don’t know. You haven’t said a goddamn thing all afternoon ‘cept to ask me what time we were going to Easter mass, ‘cause your dress isn’t clean yet. But it’s July, Callie,” ze goes on. “And you haven’t gone to church in years. Also, your hands were bleeding, man. You need to stop punching walls.”

Oh, well, then. You look down at your knuckles, and the minor injuries have mostly scabbed over.

You need some _perspective,_ even if you can’t muster any.

You walk to the mirror, and stare at your reflection until your vision blurs.

_Who am I? Where am I? What year is this? How old am I? Who’s that?_

You glance at your roommate, and you know hir, even if you don’t know yourself. It’s a method of self-defense that you've developed over the last six years, your mental ability to threat assess even when you’re…

_both here and not…_

…well, it says that this person means you no harm. Ze pauses hir game, and joins you in the bathroom.

“Y’know she’s gonna wanna take a look at your hands when she gets home,” ze points out. “If anything’s fucked up, you’re probably going to the hospital.”

“Okay,” you say in monotone. You’re not quite sure how to emote, let alone verbalize at the moment.

“What happened?” Mituna asks. Isn’t that funny? You should be asking that question.

“I um…” You want to come up with a nice way to say what you’re going to say, until your remember that this is _Mituna_. “I lost twelve hours, or close to it.”

The greatest number of consecutive hours you’ve managed to lose is 85, but this is still not good.

Mituna winces for you.

“Damn, son. You didn’t like… hurt yourself too bad or anything, didja?”

You’re not sure. You say this to Mituna.

You ask hir to leave the bathroom so you can check yourself. First, you check your body for bruising or tenderness, in areas other than your hands, and find none. Then you perform a more invasive check. You need to check, because if you’ve lost this much time, anything could have happened to you. Your pants are still buckled and zipped. Your underwear is still on. Nothing is out of place there.

That’s not entirely comforting. Anyone could have made sure you put your pants back on after…

you’re not going to think about it. _So shut up and stop thinking about it._

Maybe you’ll be forced to when Porrim comes home, because she’ll ask those questions, as tactfully as she can.

You wish you could remember where you go and what you do after you dissociate. All you can really do is fill in the blanks later on. 

You’re like a crime scene detective, the sort you used to play at being when you still played regularly with Terezi. You’re putting the pieces together.

No, you’re a cartographer, like how Aradia wanted to be, way back when. 

You’re creating a map almost entirely from scratch. A map of your mental state. But all maps are subject to a certain amount of inaccuracy.

You drop your musette bag on the floor, and your notebooks fall out. You start paging through your notes. The last three and a half pages of one correspond with today’s date, and the last two pages of the other do as well. So you went to class, at the very least. You even took notes, although in a debate team type shorthand that’s hard to decipher at first glance.

You have the words “oh no” written in the margin of some of your notes in your neatest cursive, boxed in and underlined. You think that’s a pretty apt description of things.

You scour your bag for other items. There’s a partially crumpled receipt from the bubble tea place by Bobst Library, also dated for today, or what Mituna alleges today’s date is when you ask hir. Mango green tea with fruit jelly. The receipt is dated to 3:15 PM. That’s normal enough. That’s a few minutes after you get out of class.

But where did the rocks come from, then? You don’t have the answer to that, yet.

You check your phone and confirm that today is indeed Wednesday, 21 July. Then, you start looking through your Pesterchum conversations.

Four unread messages from Eridan.

CA: im totally coming to south street seaport to meet you  
CA: you sound wweird as hell  
CA: did you take anything  
CA: besides your regular meds

Unlike Eridan, you do not augment your meds with other substances. However, that was an hour and a half ago, when he sent those texts. You don’t want to know what you said to him to worry him so, but you dial his phone number. He answers after one and a half rings.

“Callie?”

He sounds scared out of his mind.

“I’m at home, Eridan.”

Instead of letting out a sigh of relief, he has another question for you.

“Home as in…?” He trails off. “Are you in Manhattan or are you in Queens, or do you even know?”

“I’m in Porrim’s apartment, with Mituna.”

“That’s good,” he says. “While you were at the pier, you were talking about collecting more rocks and then going to Whitestone for Easter mass, and I was trying to talk you out of the last thing.”

“I don’t know how I got home, but I did,” you confess. “Where are you?”

“I toldja I was gonna meet you at South Street Seaport. So that’s where I am.”

Great. You made Eridan worry about you. Not only that, but you made him take the train all the way across the city because of your stupid brain.

“Would you like to come over?” you ask him. “You wouldn’t have to go all the way back that way.”

“Yeah, I guess so.” He sighs. “I got a few questions for you, though.”

“Go for it,” you say. Your voice sounds like it’s issuing from down a long hallway. His words come as if from a smoothly rehearsed script. How many times have you done this around him? Fallen seven or so years behind the times?

“What’s the date? What’s the year? How old are you? What grade are you in?”

“July 21st, 2010. I’m seventeen years old, and I’m kind of between grades at the moment. I’m going to be a _senior_ ," you say. "In high school.”

You think those are the right answers, unless you _really_ underestimated how much time you lost.

“Good enough,” Eridan says.


End file.
